The best thing that can be said about the new optical scan voting machines that were deployed Tuesday in primary elections statewide is this: At least they made voters nostalgic. Many voters across the state left polling places pining for the the old lever-style voting booths, with their legible ballots, unassailable privacy curtains and reassuring clicks to confirm that the votes had actually been cast.

The new voting machines were supposed to prevent another Florida 2000 scenario, confusion that ultimately made George W. Bush president. But if anecdotal reports coming out of polling places were any indication, expect some challenges to the primary results. …

Well, of course there were problems at the polls, optical scanners that wouldn’t scan, poll workers who didn’t show. This is New York, after all, last state in the union to roll out a “new and improved” voting system after the 2000 catastrophe. The real question is, what was your excuse for not voting? There ought to be a bounty of regrets. Tumbleweeds rolled through many polling places, notwithstanding incessant talk of mad voters not taking it anymore. In reality, given the skimpy turnout, the message delivered by most affiliated (non) voters was, “Whatever you voting folks decide, that will be just fine.” …

Tax cuts: Cartoon
Matt Davies comments on the debate over whether or not the Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans should be preserved.

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Rye Supervisor Joe Carvin contends that the town has been doing all that it can to battle algae in the duck pond at Rye Town Park.

Ed Forbes is the Digital Team Leader at LoHud.com and The Journal News. He holds a master's degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and a bachelor's degree from St. Lawrence University in Canton, N.Y. Prior to joining The Journal News in 2008, he was editor of the weekly Lake Placid News in Lake Placid, N.Y. He lives in Mount Kisco with his wife and their dog.

1 Comment

Daniel Bock Sr

I didn’t care too much about the new voting machines. 1st: your votes are exsposed to other people around you. 2nd: THe amount of paper that is being used to cast these ballots is a signifigant waste of paper and trees. 3rd: Who wnoties the machine when it is full, and I am sure it fills quickly and often, and where do those casted ballots go and under what security? I don’t like them, and MOST OF ALL I don’t trust that my vote will be counted as cast. I believe there is too many hands and variables to get HONEST totals. Just my opinion.